smart people who watch this stuff, they had a pretty optimistic view on the night, and so going into boston that day, we felt like we had a pretty darn good chance of winning, so, as you can imagine, it was a bit of a shock when we didn't win. >> reporter: you were the running mate. was that the campaign paul ryan would have run? >> oh, gosh. you know, i think when you join a ticket three months out, you join somebody's campaign. i was really impressed with the way mitt and ann brought us into the fold, so i was very encouraged by that. i really enjoyed it, and i wanted to run a big campaign on ideas. we did that. we ran on ideas. >> reporter: "saturday night live" poked fun at ryan, a native of janesville, wisconsin, for failing to help romney win his home state. >> mother sent me to come get you, father. >> uh-huh. >> paul ryan is doing feats of strengths in the drawing room. she thought you'd like to see. >> well, i'd like to see him carry wisconsin! [ laughter ] >> reporter: so what happened in wisconsin? you lost janesville. >> john mccain got 30%. i think we got higher than that. >> a